The Wolverine

Synopsis: Lured to a Japan he hasn't seen since World War II, century-old mutant Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) finds himself in a shadowy realm of yakuza and samurai. Wolverine is pushed to his physical and emotional brink when he is forced to go on the run with a powerful industrialist's daughter (Tao Okamoto) and is confronted -- for the first time -- with the prospect of death. As he struggles to rediscover the hero within himself, he must grapple with powerful foes and the ghosts of his own haunted past

Movie Review: "The Wolverine" is the second stand-alone Wolverine movie and it feels like this movie was an apology to fans because "X-Men Origins Wolverine" the first stand-alone Wolverine movie was terrible and was one of the most disappointing X-Men films to date. However, "The Wolverine" is action packed, entertaining and well directed, but the film suffers from a weak 3rd act in which it transforms from a dark movie to a silly and bit cartoonish one for my taste. This one finds Wolverine lured to Japan by an old acquaintance and is pushed to his physical and emotional brink when he is forced to go on the run with a powerful industrialist's daughter and is confronted for the first time with the prospect of his death. Wolverine must then deal with his own demons and he must grapple with the powerful foes and the ghost of his own haunted past. Hugh Jackman is once again great as Wolverine. Previously, he was damaged and he blamed himself for killing Jean Grey, the women he loved, and he made a vow to never kill again. In my opinion, I believe that this is Hugh Jackman's second best performance as this character that he has been playing for 17 years. What I love about this Wolverine character is that you can connect with him since the first X-Men movie. In this movie, he loses his healing powers in the first 30 minutes of the film making him vulnerable to death and no longer invincible. The entire supporting cast in this movie is great: Mariko (Tao Okamoto) is the industrialist's daughter who Wolverine has to protect from the mob and they were a great couple to watch on screen; Yukio (Rila Fukushima) who is Wolverine's protector was awesome because she has the most fighting scenes in the movie and she masters the fight choreography with ease in every scene she is in. My favorite fight scene is when Wolverine fights Shingen (Hiroyuki Sanada), Mariko's father -- this has to be one of the best fights in any X-Men movie, it was so well-choreographed, exciting and exhilarating to watch Wolverine get his powers back -- a crowd pleasing moment for comic book fans. This movie isn't perfect and there are some problems in it. Viper (Sventlana Khodchenkova) seemed too cartoon like and was just too over the top forcing me to tune out whenever she appeared. Second, the entire 3rd act of this film falls apart because the final fight between Wolverine and the Silver Samurai felt ridiculous and out of place. It completely changed the entire tone of the film. "The Wolverine" is an entertaining, action packed, and well directed film with great performances led by the great Hugh Jackman but the film suffers from an uneven plot and a bad 3rd act. This is just a fun movie that you can enjoy watching from time to time. I am giving "The Wolverine" a 3 out of 5 stars.

Director: James Mangold

Cast: Hugh Jackman, Will Yun Lee, Tao Okamoto, Rila Fukushima, Hiroyuki Sanada, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Brian Tee, Hal Yamanouchi, and Framke Janssen

Runtime: 126 minutes